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Sarah Masters reviews the film

Compassion in Exile: The Story of the 14th Dalai Lama

Unprecedented access to Tenzin Gyatso, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet, is the key to this compelling documentary of his life.

Extensive conversations between the Dalai Lama and Mickey Lemle, the film’s director, provide insight into the depth of this remarkable man. Interviews with individuals closest to the Dalai Lama including his older brother, his sister, and Heinrich Harrer, his childhood tutor and the author of Seven Years in Tibet, provide context.

With candor and humor, the Dalai Lama talks about his childhood and describes his reactions to historic events such as becoming head of state at the age of 16, traveling to China at the age of 19 to meet with Mao Zedong and plead for the safety and autonomy of his people, and fleeing Tibet at the age of 20. More than 95% of Tibetan temples and shrines were destroyed by the Chinese, and 1.2 million Tibetans, the majority Buddhist monks and nuns, lost their lives following the Chinese invasion, but the Dalai Lama adheres to a non-violent path.

The camera follows his life journey from birth in a hay barn to his selection as the 14th Dalai Lama. He was trained in Buddhist tenets, ritual and discipline, in logic, Tibetan art and cosmology, poetry, medicine, music, drama, mathematics, and more. The Dali Lama received the equivalent of a doctorate in philosophy, had to take his orals in front of 20,000 monks, all the while leading a nation under occupation. He later received the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize.

This spiritual and secular leader of Tibetans comes across as curious and highly intelligent. In the little spare time he can afford, the Dalai Lama likes to repair watches. Meanwhile, he has taught thousands the core beliefs of Buddhism, lectured to Harvard faculty on the nature of consciousness, and welcomed every Tibetan exiled to Dharamsala, India, where he lives.

Historic footage of events that marked his life are intercut with comments from Tibetan exiles who testify about the conditions in Tibet under the Chinese. As the Dalai Lama says in Compassion in Exile: "As a free spokesman for my captive countrymen and women, I feel it is my duty to speak out on their behalf. I speak not with a feeling of anger or hatred towards those who are responsible for the immense suffering of our people and the destruction of our land, homes, and culture. They too are human beings who struggle to find happiness, and deserve our compassion. I speak to inform you of the aspirations of my people because, in our struggle for freedom, truth is the only weapon we possess."

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Completed: 1992
Running Time: 62 Minutes
Director: Mickey Lemle
Music: Philip Glass
Cinematographer: Buddy Squires

If you are interested in purchasing this film, you can do so at www.hartleyfoundation.org. Just click on “Masterworks” on the homepage for more information. The cost of the film is $24.95 for a DVD.

Book Review

Chaplain John Gillman, Ph.D., reviews

Intimate Spirituality: The Catholic Way of Love and Sex

An initial reaction to the dual themes of sexual love and spirituality may strike many Catholics as intermingling about as well as oil and water. Certainly such theological giants in Christian history as Augustine would view these as strange bedfellows. In Intimate Spirituality, Hilsman makes a passionate case for his thesis that sexual love does indeed feed the soul. His reflections are a tour de force inviting church leaders, theologians, and moralists to listen deeply to the lived experience of mature lovers for the wisdom they have to offer regarding church pronouncements, leadership, and liturgy.

In the first seven chapters Hilsman explores the multiple ways that eros (sexual love) inevitably affects and can fruitfully enrich individual spirituality. After reflecting on the new meaning that loving partners bring to the theological virtues (faith, hope, love), he portrays the “enormous spiritual benefits” that the nine fruits of the Spirit (charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, trustfulness, gentleness, and self-control, Gal 5:22-23) have for intimate lovers.

Following almost in catechism fashion, the author continues by illustrating the fresh meaning that the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit (wisdom, understanding, counsel, knowledge, fortitude, piety, and fear of the Lord) offer to lover and beloved. Intense pleasure also has its shadow side, and, when misdirected, may have deadly consequences, represented by the seven vices (lust, pride, wrath, greed, sloth, gluttony, and envy) treated in chapters five and six. The spiritual remedies for the vices are the four cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude) whose exercise bring spiritual health to romantic couples (chapter seven).

In Part II, entitled “Eros and the Community,” Hilsman insightfully explores the capacity for eros to enhance the celebration of the seven sacraments, to shed new light on the evangelical counsels (poverty, chastity, and obedience), to find expression through the seven corporal works of mercy and the seven spiritual works of mercy. In the last chapter the author challenges religious leaders to learn from “the cooperative intimacy of lovers” (p. 166) by putting aside the need to control and by integrating the mind and heart.

Drawing upon wisdom honed from his experience as husband and father, chaplain and pastoral educator, Hilsman persuasively articulates how sexual love can be a fertile resource not only for a vibrant spirituality but also for a renewed experience of Church that pulsates with life, both human and Divine.

Hilsman, Gordan J. Intimate Spirituality: The Catholic Way of Love and Sex. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., Lanham, MD, 2007, 186.

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